“Trust—How To Build
It, Use It,
Prosper
From It”

A patient trusting
you remains the
solution to your
medical
career success and
prosperity any way
you cut it.

Trusting is an
emotional process by
which a person gains
assurance that their
belief in their
doctor’s
professionalism will
be confirmed over
time. This emotion
happens only when it
is preceded bya doctor’s display
of professional
competency,
knowledge, and
special gifted
talents and skills.

Trust is accelerated
when that patient
feels understood,
respected, and
compassion shown.
This implies that
the trustworthiness
of a doctor is
perceived by the
patient at every
interaction with
their doctor in
their ongoing
healthcare.

The question then
arises, are you
trustworthy? Can you
improve your
trustworthiness even
more? How does doing
that improve my
medical practice in
any significant
manner?

Building trust is
essential to all
relationships

Trusting people can
definitely be
improved. Learning
how to trust people
is important. It’s
essential in our
society today
because of the
increasing
skepticism,
cynicism, and fear
of making the wrong
choices. In medical
practice it’s the
increasing lack of
doctor-patient
rapport.

Dave
Bowman, human
resources expert,
describes in his
article, “The
Five Best Ways to
Build-And Lose Trust
In The Workplace,”
five effective ways
to create trust in
business settings,
which are also
reliable in personal
trust experiences.

1.Establish and
maintain integrity:

Your integrity is
the cornerstone for
trust. Integrity is
established by
keeping you “word”
or promises, being
truthful, being
always reliable and
dependable, being
adherent to your
core beliefs,
completing all
tasks, and remain
functional
regardless of
diversity.

2.Doing what’s right:

Not doing it for
expediency. It means
that doing what’s
intuitively right
may conflict with
your personal
beliefs, which may
put you at personal,
social, or
professional risk.

3.Communication
Clarity:

The value of clarity
in communication is
critical to
understanding,
decision making, and
expected compliance,
especially in
medical practice.
This is also
important to
effective medical
office management.
When you avoid
explaining your
goals, visions, and
expectations to your
employees, they will
inevitably look to
their own previous
experiences for
direction and what
they perceive to be
compliance with your
ideas. Focus on
shared goals, not
personal.

4.Constant
improvement:

It includes both
your medical
practice and medical
practice business
management. As
Samuel Arbesman
reminds us
in his
book, The
Half-Life of Facts:
Why Everything We
Know Has an
Expiration Date,
medical students are
often told that what
you have
learned
will be outdated in
five years. Medical
facts, procedures,
information,
knowledge,
strategies,
perceptions, and
advice are
constantly changing.

5.Personal Maturity
Adaptations:

As your maturity
ripens over time you
become more
malleable, more
forgiving, more
likely to accept the
unintentional
mistakes and
blunders of our
peers and patients,
and you adjust your
personality to a
“let’s get along”
mode. The sooner
that
happens the
better doctor you
will be. Also, the
more trustworthy you
become because of
your basic need to
be a naturally
social human being.

Destroying your
trustworthiness, can
occur with just one
single
happening

Once you permit your
emotions to override
your reasoning, the
probability for a
permanent regretful
event opens. The
irrational and
unexpected emotional
verbal blast reaches
beyond the victim’s
eardrums. That
rampage, whether
physical or verbal,
reverberates for
days, weeks, or
years in that
victim’s mind.

The recoil from a
single event is
often enough to
terminate a
relationship in
medical practice or
in any business.
This is the kind of
thing that
significantly
and
permanently changes
how the other people
who witnessed this
disturbing
experience, as well
as the victim, see
you.

It’s something
that’s remembered as
something to be
avoided in the
future—who knows if
you can be trusted
to never do it
again, like a
ticking time bomb.
Apologies help
reduce the impact,
but not the memory.
Future relationships
with others who
heard about it are
also affected
negatively.

I have witnessed
many of these
disturbing episodes
in my medical career
between patients,
doctors, nurses, and
other professionals.
And, I remember
them
as if it
happened
yesterday.

Many times the
conflict is of mild
consequence and
later forgotten.
Even then,
the memory may be
recalled due to some
triggering effect,
and then can
interfere with the
expected good
results evolving
from the
subconscious
or conscious mind.

Other ways your
trustworthiness
comes into doubt

1.

Inconsistent
behavior or actions
-Repetitive changes
in how you respond
to the
same issues
create confusion and
uncertainty. A
pattern of vague or
variable behavior
means the recipient
must never trust how
you will respond to
issues. It often is
the case when
patient’s fear
revealing
their
secrets to doctors,
which may draw
criticism or even
insults
from
their
doctor.

2.

Mindset for your
personal agenda
-Every time you hurry
through your patient
schedule, you are
doing this. You
can’t hide it but
you can soften the
impact on your
patients. My
favorite trick for
doing that I
learned
from Robert B.
Cialdini, PhD, in
his book, “INFLUENCE: The
Psychology
of
Persuasion.”

His in-depth studies
about human behavior
are recognized world
wide. A person’s
intrusiveness into
another’s intended
activity can be
accepted, tolerated,
or pardoned when the
intruder presents
the person with a
reason for the
intrusion. Almost
every time when you
offer a person a
“because… ”
reason for stepping
into their space,
that person will
not
be offended.

Otherwise, they
will. The reason
doesn’t even need to
be sensible. Learn
how to give
“because” answers
for butting in to a
patient’s scheduled
office time
and visit.

3.

Not remembering your
patients -Patients expect
their doctor to
remember them, at
least greet them
using their first
name, or in the
case
of an older patient,
their last name with
the appropriate
prefixes
(Mrs. XXXXX).

The problem is
resolved by first
scanning their
medical record for
what
you did for
their last visit,
their name, and
treatment before you
see the patient. It
takes about one
minute... time well
spent.

Doctor’s who enter
the exam room and
don’t remember the
patient or
their
last visit reduces
the patient’s
confidence in
them... and therefore
a
bit of their trust.
Normally, doctors
don’t remember
patient’s names
or
last appointment
treatment.

Patients are
disappointed when
their doctor doesn’t
remember them or
their problems, even
though we know that
we do not have a
photographic memory.
Try the “one minute
drill.” It’s
probably the most
effective
way to
create loyalty of
your patients that I
know.

4.

Dishonesty with
patients -This can be outright
lying to them or
simply avoiding
important issues
related to their
medical care. It’s a
complex issue that
is skewed by events,
personalities, and
medical diagnoses.
The question here
is, “Do we have a
responsibility to
reveal everything to
the patient about
their care and
treatment, even that
we consider it to be
potentially damaging
to them?”

The concern about
medical malpractice
risk arises when you
limit what
you tell
patients. Does full
informed consent
ring a bell? If
you’re doing major
surgery, do you tell
them they might die
during the surgery
or afterward? Most
doctors know how
much to tell
patients because
revealing too much
will make patient’s
run elsewhere. The
next doctor may tell
the patient the same
thing, but by then
the patient may
accept it (the
second opinion
myth).

The solution I’ve
found useful is by
using semantics.
Some words are
powerful and hit the
patient like a
sledge hammer, and
some are weak
that
mean the same thing
but
cause no terror.

Instead of telling a
patient they have
“malignant cancer,”
you can tell
them
they have a “tumor”
that might spread.

Instead of telling a
patient they have an
“incurable disease,”
you could
tell them
that their disease
is, “something that
will be needed to be
followed for a long
time.”

What angers
patient’s is
discovering later
what should have
been told
to them in
the beginning.
Patients are not
lost because you do
that... a
fear among
doctors.

5.

Rigid mindedness
-My last year of
medical practice an
associate physician
agreed to do surgery
on a patient of mine
because my hospital
contract was ending
and I was told not
to do surgery the
last 3 months
left.
A month later the
patient came to me
and told me that the
doctor refused to do
the surgery as he
had agreed.

Turns out that he
had a standing rule
for himself that a
patient had to
sign
a special consent
document in the
preop room. It
contained rather
outrageous
statements
protecting the
doctor. The patient
refused to
sign it
and left the
hospital with her
husband in a rage.

When I confronted
that doctor about
that problem, he was
absolutely unwilling
to bend his own
rules under any
circumstances. I had
no idea
he felt that
way and he didn’t
mention it to me
during the
arrangements
we
made.

Doctor’s who
practice in a
dictatorial manner
toward their
patients often
demonstrate their
weaknesses—such as
insecurity relative
to their knowledge
or skills, overt
arrogance, or fear
of malpractice
resulting
if they
try something
different and it
goes wrong.Learn to bend as
much as possible
with patient’s
wishes or even
demands. Patients
will respect you
more and show much
more loyalty to your
practice. It’s not
hard to prescribe
alternative
medications, or not
do
certain
procedures during
surgery, or refuse
certain types of
treatment for their
medical problem.

6.Show your
incompetence -

If you have areas of
incompetence,
don’t
ever reveal that to
patients. I’m not
saying that a
gynecologist
shouldn’t
tell
patients that he
doesn’t do heart
surgery. What I am
saying
is that
when
you don’t feel
completely
comfortable doing a
certain
procedure or
treatment, then
refer the patient to
an
appropriate
specialist.

Patients understand
that approach to
their care. It
indicates to them
how much you care
for their welfare
and outcomes to be
top notch.

On the other hand,
when a doctor
blatantly stutters
around in front of a
patient trying to
decide on the
appropriate
treatment and has to
go look
it up in a
medical textbook
first, patients
quickly lose trust
in the doctor. The solution here is
to stick to one
proper regimen of
treatment and if
necessary call the
patient the next day
and change the
prescription,
while
telling them that
you consulted with
another doctor to
find a better
treatment you hadn’t
heard of. It doesn’t
mean you can’t tell
patients
that you
don’t know the best
treatment for their
condition, but don’t
make a fool out of
your incompetence in
front of
the patient.

7.Berate other
doctors -

Doing this in front
of or directly to
your patient gives
the patients a clear
view of what you
also think of
them...
at least it’s
their perception.
Making statements
about how badly the
previous doctor
treated your new
patient is just
shooting yourself
in
the foot.

Most intelligent
patients know that
such statements are
an indication of
your own insecurity.
The act of
belittling someone
else is an attempt
to elevate your own
status. It’s a
rather dismal
personality habit
that serves
no one
but yourself.

Professionals who
berate other
professionals don’t
deserve to be called
professionals. This
type of professional
evolves into an
outsider in the
local medical
community and
commonly loses many
patients and
referred
patients as
a result.

“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in
effective
communications. It’s
the foundational
principle
that holds all
relationships."
---Stephen R. Covey

Should you have the
inclination to avoid
taking advantage of
the lessons on this
website concerning
marketing your
private medical
practice, you might
consider the
possibility of your
family ending up as
this photo shows you
from the 1920s.
Never
happen...right?

You might find that
you'll need to be
moving your medical
practice often to
support your
family--kind of an
ultimate example of
a traveling doctor
earning a living
making house calls
as you go.

This rather negative
picture of medical
life should at least
make you wonder a
bit about where
medicine is headed
under a second Obama
term in the White
House. Now we know!

ARTICLE---DAN
KENNEDY

The
Renegade Millionaire Way

by Dan S.
Kennedy

Test and
Grow Rich

“Testing” is an ugly
topic. Why? Because testing
variables in advertising
direct mail, phone scripts
and sales presentations
requires discipline,
diligence and patience. To
get it right, you can only
test one variable at a time.
This means that if you
change a headline, you can’t
change anything else. Plus
you have to make sure all
other variables remain the
same, like the mailing day
or a war breaking out that
has everybody watching CNN
day and night or the
President getting caught
again with his drawers down
or a hurricane hitting.

Frankly, most business
people will just not go
through the “detailitis”
required to test - which is
why it’s a very good idea to
model proven promotions. And
in some cases where you’re
only going to use something
once or twice or you’re
dealing with a very small
number, it’s just not worth
testing; instead, you take
your best shot. But let’s
assume you’re working on
something you intend to use
over and over and over again
in some significant
quantity, so that it’s worth
real effort to fine-tune
it...

I have some tips for you:
first of all, there’s
non-testing testing - huh?
Well, I describe that in my
book ‘The Ultimate Sales
Letter’ (available at
http://www.gkicresourcecenter.com/books-by-dan-kennedy-and-bill-glazer/the-ultimate-sales-letter/
), where I talk about the
steps to take with a
finished sales letter before
you actually mail it.
Second, there’s split
testing, which is the
fastest way to test and get
to a reasonable conclusion.
Let’s assume you have a
postcard and you want to
leave everything the same
but test four different
headlines, and you have
4,000 similar addresses to
mail to. You do “nth name
testing”; that means
Headline #A goes to every
4th name, Headline #B to
every 5th name, Headline #C
to every 5th name, etc.

So you evenly divide the
list without bias among the
headlines being tested. Some
media (like Val-Pak or Money
Mailer) will let you split
test within a single buy.
Third, there’s testing
against a control. A
“control” is a marketing
strategy that already works
well and you’re using it on
a continuing basis - maybe
it’s a series of letters you
mail every month. You have
been using it long enough
you know what it produces.
You have a “known” to
measure against. Now you can
start trying to improve that
control, ideally one step or
variable at a time.

If I’m trying to beat a
control, here are the “hot”
variables I’ll look at
closely, to see if there’s
room for improvement:

The offer

The guarantee(s)

The urgency of response

The big idea or big
promise

The overcoming of
skepticism i.e.
credibility and
believability

The style or tone of the
writing itself

The look of the piece

By the way, little, very
testable things DO sometimes
make very big differences.
Recently I showed an example
in my newsletter of a guy
who just added four
rubber-stamped words to the
outside of his envelope, and
beat his control by 300%. I
once brought a TV
infomercial back from the
dead by raising the
price of the product.

Gary Halbert saved the
Pearl Cream advertising by
adding a particular bonus.
In 1984, after attending my
seminar, a dentist in
Sacramento changed five
words on his Val-Pak coupon
and went from getting two or
three new patients a month
to 15 to 20. This is the
sort of thing that makes
direct-response advertising
as frustrating as golf. (Did
you happen to see John Daly
miss a
put seven times and
scratch himself out of the
tournament a
few weeks back?
Ugh.)

Obviously, you can’t test
if you can’t, won’t or don’t
collect accurate data. You
have to code every offer,
and track where every ounce
of business comes from. If
you have employees who are
lax about this, you must
educate them about the
importance, discipline them
if they goof it up, and
ultimately can’em if they
won’t do it right 100% of
the time. I confess that I
fly by the seat of my pants
in my business more than I
should, but I can’t fire me,
God knows there are days I
should. Anyway, I can assure
you: the clients I have with
the best profits and incomes
possess the best information
about where their business
comes from.

Let me switch gears and
talk briefly about another
aspect of “testing”. This is
actually how all highly
successful entrepreneurs
view everything they do...as
testing. They do NOT see
things in the context of
“success” or “failure” like
ordinary people do, and as a
result they do not become
“de-motivated” like most
people do. See, most people
drain all the vitality,
courage, optimism and
git-up-n-go out of
themselves by focusing on
all the things they do that
don’t work out well, as a
compilation of failures.

But successful people
understand the powerful
impact of that negative
reinforcement on their own
self-image (somewhat akin to
the impact of pouring a
gallon of toxic waste into a
pint of clear water,
drinking the result, and
wondering why the stomach
backs up into the
esophagus). Instead, they
carefully organize the
things they do into a series
or sequence of experiments,
testing options, and
focusing on the ones they
find that work. And they
fully expect to go through
any number of experiments
that don’t pan out before
walking away from the lab
with a winner. This not only
has practical relevance, it
has profound psychological
ramifications.

Just like a little tweak
in thinking can make a big
difference in the results of
say, an ad or a flyer, a
little tweak in thinking can
make a giant difference in
the life results experienced
by an individual.

DAN S. KENNEDY
is a serial,
multi-millionaire
entrepreneur; highly paid
and sought after marketing
and business strategist;
advisor to countless
first-generation,
from-scratch
multi-millionaire and
7-figure income
entrepreneurs and
professionals; and, in his
personal practice, one of
the very highest paid
direct-response copywriters
in America. As a speaker, he
has delivered over 2,000
compensated presentations,
appearing repeatedly on
programs with the likes of
Donald Trump, Gene Simmons
(KISS), Debbi Fields (Mrs.
Fields Cookies), and many
other
celebrity-entrepreneurs, for
former U.S. Presidents and
other world leaders, and
other leading business
speakers like Zig Ziglar,
Brian Tracy and Tom Hopkins,
often addressing audiences
of 1,000 to 10,000 and up.
His popular books have been
favorably recognized by
Forbes, Business Week, Inc.
and Entrepreneur Magazine.
His NO B.S. MARKETING
LETTER, one of the business
newsletters published for
Members of Glazer-Kennedy
Insider's Circle, is the
largest paid subscription
newsletter in its genre in
the world.